


Enjoy The Ride

by thewaythatwerust



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Banter, Claustrophobic Tony Stark, Fade to Black, Flirting, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Helpful Steve Rogers, M/M, One Shot, Panic Attacks, Sex is better than Xanax, Stony - Freeform, Trapped In Elevator, mention of PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:47:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22454401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewaythatwerust/pseuds/thewaythatwerust
Summary: Tony doesn’t need the suit to assess his bio-data and let him know that, no, he’s very, very not okay. Trying to keep his heart in his chest where it belongs, and not taking center stage in some kind of cardiological remake of Alien, he eyes Steve cautiously. “So, uh, would this be a bad time to tell you I’m more than slightly claustrophobic? And by more than slightly, I mean extremely.”Steve stares at him dumbly. “What are you talking about? You spend half of your life in a tin can.”
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 38
Kudos: 203
Collections: POTS (18+) Stony Stocking 2019





	Enjoy The Ride

**Author's Note:**

  * For [only_more_love](https://archiveofourown.org/users/only_more_love/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [only_more_love](https://archiveofourown.org/users/only_more_love/pseuds/only_more_love) in the [stony_stocking_2019](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/stony_stocking_2019) collection. 



> For _onlymorelove_ who wanted _laughter or ridiculous things happening to characters—during sex or just in daily life_ \- I took a few of your extra 'likes' and ran with them, I hope this checks a few of your boxes!

Steve presses the elevator’s emergency phone handset back into the cradle on the wall and sighs. “They’ve called maintenance, but they don’t have an ETA yet.”

Tony blanches. “We’re stuck in here for an as-yet indeterminable amount of time?”

Steve nods. “Looks like.”

“Can’t you just, y’ know --” Tony jerks his head to the ceiling, “-- do your thing and scamper up and out that way? And take me with you, of course.”

Steve’s eyes lift to the ceiling, and he shakes his head. “There’s no hatch.”

“So make one.”

“Patience is a virtue, Tony. It’s not going to kill you to wait.”

Wringing his hands together, Tony mutters, “It might.” He doesn’t need the suit to assess his bio-data and let him know that, no, he’s very, very _not_ okay. Trying to keep his heart in his chest where it belongs, and not taking center stage in some kind of cardiological remake of _Alien_ , he eyes Steve cautiously. “So, uh, would this be a bad time to tell you I’m more than slightly claustrophobic? And by more than slightly, I mean _extremely_.”

Steve stares at him dumbly. “What are you talking about? You spend half of your life in a tin can.”

Tony waves Steve’s words away impatiently. Good ol’ Steve, if he didn’t have the serum coursing through his rather attractive veins, his superpower would be oversimplification. “That’s different. My suits are comfortable, like metal pajamas with life support. That and they have the added benefit of being a form of voluntary confinement.” Tony’s words leave him in a rush, like rats abandoning a sinking ship, as if they can sense his lungs are about to collapse. “This is not voluntary. This is very much the opposite of voluntary. Extremely involuntary. And is this box shrinking, or is it just me?” He presses two fingers into the seam where his neck meets his shirt collar and tugs frantically.

“Tony…”

Ordinarily, he gets along fine with elevators - when they’re moving and the amount of time required to be encased in one is limited. Right now, however, given that neither of those qualifiers remain true, the object in question has become an enemy combatant and shall be treated as such. He reaches for the band around his wrist that will unfurl into his gauntlet. “So. I’m going to blast us out of here now.”

Steve catches Tony’s hand and halts his movement. His voice slips quickly to the _I’m not angry, just disappointed_ tone he’s perfected wrangling the Avengers these past years. “You can’t blast your way out of the elevator, Tony. We’re in _Canada_. You can’t just blow things up in Canada.”

Staring at Steve and trying to concentrate on anything other than the large hand still wrapped around his, Tony scoffs. “What are you talking about? It’s the _best_ place to blow things up. I doubt they’ll even be mad. I bet they don’t even send me a bill. They’ll probably apologize to me for their stupid elevator putting me in this position in the first place, which, come to think of it, they really should.”

Steve plants himself between Tony and the elevator doors. Still holding his hand, Steve bends slightly to align their eye levels. “Look at me. You’re fine. Your brain is just playing tricks on you. Take a deep breath.”

Tony stares at the beautiful eyes in front of him. Blue, of course. Bright blue against equally bright white. The hysteria creeping around the edges of his brain realizes that when Steve cries, his eyes must be red, white, and blue. He fucking cries patriotism. Tony makes a strangled noise in his throat and shakes his head wildly, trying to clear the random data dump in his brain. “There’s not enough air in this box to _take_ a deep breath, Rogers.”

The reassuring warmth disappears from his hand, and Tony barely resists the impulse to reach out and grab it back, because wow, that would be embarrassing. Steve reaches into the bag slung low around his hip, retrieving a rectangular foil package and a small bottle of water. Tony’s eyes feel wild and flittery, like ocular hummingbirds, as they dart around the small box that is getting smaller by the second. The sound of Steve cracking what Tony now realizes is an icepack, activating the endothermic reaction, makes him wince. His focus catches on Steve’s hands as he continues his sharp ascent into hyperventilation.

“Is that an ice pack? I don’t have a pulled muscle here, you star-spangled boy scout. Just let me blast us out of here. It’ll be fine. I’ll buy the hotel a new elevator. Hell, I’ll buy the whole hotel and install an elevator that actually works.”

Steve doesn’t answer, just wraps the blue and white pack around the bottle.

“So, I’m starting to get dizzy. Are you starting to get dizzy? It could be the carbon dioxide. Oh, I should have worn the suit to dinner. I was _going_ to wear the suit to dinner. Why didn’t I wear the suit to dinner?” Tony bends forward, pressing his palms to his legs and ducking his head between his knees, sucking in short, harsh breaths. He can see the headlines now, _Iron Man Taken Down By Elevator._

Steve rubs over Tony’s back with his free hand, soothingly. “It’s going to be okay, Tony.”

The garbled noise in his throat is somewhere between a laugh and a scream. “I’m pretty sure we passed okay about ten minutes ago, Cap. We’re rapidly speeding into very _not okay_ territory without brakes or airbags.” A slight tremor is the only warning he gets before his legs buckle, and he's sliding down the elevator wall to the floor.

Steve crouches down next to him, resting on the balls of his feet. He pushes the disposable pack back into his bag, now resting on the floor, strap hanging limply from his shoulder. He untwists the cap from the water and presses it into Tony’s hands. “Drink.”

Tony curls his fingers around the bottle and frowns down at it with vision that is darkening around the edges. “You’re seriously at me to hydrate right now?”

Firm finger slide under the bottom of the bottle, urging it up to Tony’s lips. “The quickest way to reset your brain is with a temperature change.” Tony can feel the weight of Steve’s stare on his throat, watching it bob as he chugs the now cold water. “And the quickest way to change your temperature is internally, with this.”

When the bottle is empty, Steve takes it, replaces the cap, and tucks it back in his bag. Tony shifts his focus to his own hands, fingers opening and closing around thin air.

“How are you feeling? Any better?”

“Yes? No? I don’t know? I still feel…” Tony still feels like he’s falling, though it's not _quite_ as terrifyingly as before. He squeezes his eyes shut, trying desperately to resist flopping onto the floor and curling up in the fetal position. 

“Hey, Tony?”

Tony’s eyes flicker open, zeroing in on the way Steve’s teeth are trapping his lower lip in some kind of obliviously erotic gesture. 

“Have you ever had sex in an elevator?”

Tony’s eyes jerk straight up to Steve’s. “I - uh - what?”

“Have you ever had --”

“No, I heard you the first time. I just meant... ah...” Tony’s pretty sure he’s just suffered acute mental whiplash. Or... a dislocation? A dislocated brain. Is that a thing? It must be a thing because he’s pretty sure he has it and is going to need some form of mental traction. “Uh. Um. No…?”

“Do you want to?”

Tony can feel his mouth moving though no sound is coming out. He blinks stupidly, like a flashing cursor on a blank page, waiting for words to appear. “Uh, is that a, uh--” He clears his throat. “Are you _propositioning_ me, Rogers?”

Steve’s face remains frustratingly neutral. “What would you say if I was?”

Tony’s brain is reeling, trying -and failing- to follow the abrupt u-turn in conversation. They’ve been dancing around the edges of this ... _thing_ -whatever it is between them- for a while now. And if Captain America’s secret kink is panic attacks, Tony might as well roll with it. It can’t be said that he doesn't seize opportunities with both hands. And he’s more than willing to lay hands and mouth and more on this particular opportunity. “I’d say we would probably wrack up more damage to this box than my repulsors could ever dream of achieving.”

Steve clears his throat. “How are you feeling?”

“You tell me. I give you blanket permission to lay your hands on me and find out,” Tony murmurs, noticing how fetching Steve looks with that splash of red high on his cheekbones.

“Uh, I mean your anxiety attack. Are you okay?”

“My - oh.” Tony’s head notches to the side, just realizing his panic attack has subsided. Or, perhaps more accurately, now that the blood that had been inflaming his brain is currently swelling other parts of his anatomy, his focus has seemingly shifted with it. Tony peers at Steve, suspicion slowing his words. “How do you know about anxiety attacks?”

“The internet. It’s so --”

“Helpful, yeah. But why are you using it to research this, specifically? Most people just use it for porn.”

The red on Steve’s cheeks spreads quickly to every inch of skin on display, and, Tony hopes, all the parts that aren’t.

“You really don’t know?” Steve’s voice is soft, and his eyes waver like they want to fix on anything but Tony.

Tony internally bemoans the fact the finite amount of blood in his body doesn’t seem to be sufficient to power two heads at once. With his brain running on half power, it takes a moment for the puzzle pieces to line up and click into place. “Oh. Right. All your time spent in war, and ice, and as a lab rat, you’ve probably got PTSD enough to rival mine. We should compare notes sometime.” The levity in his voice is due only to the hollowness of the words, but Steve doesn’t push the point.

There's a long silence before Steve says slowly, “It’s not because I have them; it’s because _you_ do.”

 _Huh._ Steve had been researching for him. So that means... “You wanted to see if it makes me a liability in the field. To the team.” Tony says flatly, flushing hot for all the wrong reasons.

“Tony, no, I -- _no_. I just wanted to know what to do when it happened again. I wanted to be able to help.”

“So that’s what all this was? You helping?”

Steve nods.

“The water?”

“Yeah.”

“The sexual overture?”

“Oh.” Steve wrings his hands as he shrugs sheepishly. “Uh, distractions are meant to help.”

“You were trying to distract me from a racing heart and sweaty skin with thoughts of things that induce a racing heart and sweaty skin? That doesn't really hold water, even for a guy walking off sixty-odd years of brain freeze. I think your distraction for me was just an excuse for you.” Oh please let it be an excuse. Pretty please, with sprinkles on top.

“I --” Steve's words falter as the elevator jolts into motion and he falls forward. Caught off-guard, he flings his arm out, bracing himself against the wall beside Tony’s head.

“Well, would you look at that? Captain America, off-balance. I never thought I’d see the day.”

Steve’s face is so close to his, that the rush of air carrying his words brushes over Tony's lips like a warm caress as Steve murmurs, “I’m always off-balance around you, Stark.”

Steve’s gaze falls and locks on to his lips, and Tony can’t stop from swiping his tongue over them, watching as Steve’s eyes darken in response. Reaching up to run a tentative thumb over Steve’s pulse point, Tony smiles when he feels the erratic thumping of Steve's heart a mirror of his own.

“Is this actually, _finally_ happening?” Tony tries -and fails- to keep the _giddy schoolgirl_ out of his voice.

“You’ve thought about this?” Steve’s unspoken “ _too_ ” hangs in the air between them.

“I can’t lie and say I haven’t been waiting for this day. Or, hoping for it at the very least. Hardcore hoping. And dreaming. Lots of dreaming, and very often the liquid variety.”

Steve’s soft chuckle sends the nerves down Tony's spine jumping up like they’re doing The Wave.

“Are you sure you’re up to this, Tony? If you’re still--”

Tony’s hand slides around the back of Steve’s neck and tugs him forward, swallowing down the soft gasp of surprise and the rest of Steve's self-sacrificing sentence. He’s pretty sure he can’t get any _more_ up for this. He’s already making a mess of his favorite suit pants as it is.

The soft ding of the elevator arriving at Tony’s floor has Steve breaking the kiss with a breathless groan. “Please tell me your room has a double bed.”

“Have you met me? It’s a king. But I believe you said something about sex in an elevator, Rogers. Captain America wouldn’t go back on his word, would he?”

“Tony! We can’t --”

“Give me one good reason why we can’t; one that doesn’t involve the word Canada.”

“I -- uh. You’re claustrophobic?”

Tony pushes Steve back, grinning as he falls on his ass and his back thuds against the wall of the lift, soft strands of hair flopping down over his forehead. Tony surges forward, climbs onto Steve, and seats himself on ridiculously thick thighs.

Reaching up an impatient hand, Tony jabs at the _close doors_ button before drifting down to engage the large, red _emergency stop_ button once they're re-cocooned in the metal box.

“You know what they say: it’s important to face your fears. So how about a little, or, uh--” Tony groans as he grinds in Steve’s lap, “--or not so little distraction? The water was great and all, but I can think of something else I’d rather have inside me right now.”

“ _Tony,”_ -And god if Steve's voice moaning his name isn't the best sound Tony's ever heard- “we can’t --”

“Yes, yes, we can. I’ve _been_ patient, Steve. Hell, if patience is a virtue, I’m in line for sainthood. I’ve been waiting for you to get with the program since you sauntered onto that damned hellicarrier. Listening to you telling me to put on the suit when all I wanted to do was rip yours off.” Tony lets his hands trace over Steve's body with abandon - making up for lost time.

Steve's moan echoes around them. “I was just going to say we can’t do this sitting down.” Strong hands slide under Tony’s ass, taking his weight as Steve lifts them both in one smooth move. Tony's squeak of surprise is chased by throaty groan as Steve somehow shucks his pants without putting him down.

As Steve's fingers wrap around him, Tony’s brain glitches. Sweat beads his hairline, his vision fills with static, and his heart is doing hurdles in his chest - all the usual warning signals that herald an impending meltdown. But this time, he’s pretty sure the only melting that’s about to take place is his brain liquefying and getting pumped out of his dick by _Steve Fucking Rogers_.  
  
Tony can't help but revel in the fact the virtue of patience has rewarded him his biggest vice - the one that is working on sucking a bruise into his neck with eager lips, setting off bright white sparks of pleasure behind his closed eyelids. He's not sure if he's climbing to heaven or headed to hell in a hand basket, but for the first time ever in an elevator, he isn't thinking about the destination, he's just going to enjoy the ride.  
  



End file.
